Re: [Gpsbabel-code] RFC for changes

[Robert L. <rob...@us...>]

Paula and Norman Radder wrote:

>   xxx_DEGREES - Degrees only.  Where xxx is either/both LAT and LON
>   xxx_MINUTES -  Minutes part of a position.
>   xxx_DECMINUTES - Position in minutes. For example 1 deg 15 min = 75 
> minutes. Used by Chart Navigator

I like these.

>   USERINT - to hold a user defined integer.  My GPS (ICOM GP-270ML) 
> includes the waypoint's internal number in its waypoint download
>   USERSTRING - to hold a user defined string.  These two required two new 
> fields in the waypoint record.

I'm not so sure about these.  GPSBabel is fundamentally about
conversions and don't see how you convert an arbitrary user defined
integer from one format to another.  Yes, we have cases in struct waypt
of things that aren't representable in every format, but this seems to
stretch it.   

Consider the cases of two formats, each using USERINT; now what do you do?

>    SUBFIELD - for delimited fields that contain subfields. Chart Navigator 
> prefixes the waypoint name with 48sgw. This will strip it off.
>                          Example data:  ...<tabchar>48sgwA waypoint name 
> here<tabchar>...
>                                     IFIELD  SUBFIELD, 
> '''48sgw"DESCRIPTION", "%s;%s"
>              On input - csv_util scans over the string and parses next into 
> DESCRIPTION
>              On output - csv_util puts out the string followed by the value 
> of DESCRIPTION

Can't the same result be achived with literal constants in the field specifiers?

>  New Statements
> ------------------------
>   PLUS_DIRECTION <ns> - allow change for external signs of degrees. The 
> internal signs remain the same as NE.  Chart Navigator uses NW.
>       Required two new fields in the xcsv_file record to save the plus lat 
> and long directions.

I don't understand this.  

> New options
> ------------------
>  FIELD_DELIMITER  NONE -  Use empty string for delimiter, ie no delimter. 
> Allow you to control output a bit more.
>     Example:    IFIELD  CONSTANT, "4003", "", "%s<tabchar>"
>                        IFIELD  SUBFIELD,  ""48sgw"DESCRIPTION", 
> "%s;%s<tabchar>"
>       This might not be needed. I found that I can include the <tabchar> in 
> the printf format arg.	  But its only a ONE line change to xcsv!

I'm pretty clammy to this one.  This stuff is to handle BLAH separated
values and it just seems weird to not have a separator.  Let's drop this
this one, please.

> Misc changes
> ------------------
>    main.c - added '(-x option)' to printf(...) for user doc
>    nmea.c - 1)  increased size of sname from 6 to 17 to allow longer 
> waypoint names

But doesn't the NMEA standard say they're six?

>                  4) nocksum - new option to leave off the checksum at end

Doesn't the NMEA standard say there will be a checksum at the end?


RJL